"MODULAR CLASSROOMS"
The President's Message, May 1999
by Linc Moss, Ramtech Building Systems, Inc.

The Issue. For the last several years, many print articles and several television spots have surfaced complaining about the use of modular classrooms as supplemental facilities on our nation's public school campuses. Typically these articles peak around election time or "sweeps week." Often the gist of the piece centers on the public "eyesore" these buildings create, the inconvenience of walking to and from the modular classrooms in bad weather, and even the safety of those students occupying these buildings. Recently, the Philadelphia Inquirer Sunday Magazine published a story concerning the use of portable classrooms in several of the more upscale neighborhoods around suburban Philadelphia. This is probably one of the more even-handed articles written on this subject, however, it still poses very little that is flattering to our industry.

In many school districts, the modular classroom has become the central focus for additional educational funding. The rallying cry, "no more trailers" even made it into President Clinton's State of the Union Address. This was in conjunction with Clinton's Education Accountability Act calling for tougher guidelines associated with continued federal assistance. The problem that school administrators face is that, as our population grays, it is more difficult for bond issues to pass. In many areas the primary tax base is losing ties to education. With the children grown and fixed incomes looming on the horizon, many Americans are balking at higher property taxes to support additional schools. As a result, more and more school districts have to look at interim solutions. The flip side of this situation is suburban neighborhoods receiving the influx of urban-flight and the continued growth in the Sunbelt states. While these people are younger with school age children, the residential growth in these areas is far outpacing the needed tax support from industry. The only solution is to raise property taxes.

Why Us? What has caused our industry to become associated with this negativity? MBI member companies provide code compliant clean comfortable buildings to answer our school overcrowding. We should be the good guys in this story, not the purveyors of junk we're often depicted as. Maybe an introspective look should be the first order of business to determine how much we've contributed to this mindset. The Inquirer article highlights a "50-foot trailer". This single-wide does not provide the most conducive learning environment. Typically classrooms are configured more like a square than a rectangle. The use of doublewides or complexes allows more conventional space planning in this occupancy than does a single-wide. The teacher using the building explains how, due to the configuration, she had to place student desks in "pods" rather than rows. She also commented on how the code-required handicapped toilet occupies an inordinate amount of interior room and now doubles as a storage closet. Placement of a single-wide structure for use as a classroom just invites public criticism. The way buildings are specified and designed can contribute or help diffuse issues similar to this. When we use the cheapest materials in the construction of the building, set the building without skirting, and construct "rickety" exterior stairs and ramps, we create an atmosphere of inferiority when compared to the existing structures that we are supplementing. Even though the building is temporary, execution of the work and the materials used should reflect the very best when children are the prime occupants.

More Classrooms. There are many factors that contribute to the wide spread use of modular classrooms. Gaining momentum throughout the nation currently are several classroom size reduction initiatives. Studies show that smaller classes help teachers provide more personal attention to students and spend less time on discipline; as a result, students learn more and get a stronger foundation in the basic skills. Several states have even mandated student-to-teacher ratios. Other states reported to be involved in or considering some sort of class size reduction initiative include Arizona, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma and Utah.

California's story is somewhat typical of states with a classroom size reduction initiative. In the 1996-97 school year, California began its Class Size Reduction Program, through which it gives money to school districts for the purpose of reducing the student/teacher ratio to 20 to 1 in kindergarten through third grade. In the 1997/98 school year, 1.9 million students were assigned to smaller classes in California schools. California school districts hired 18,000 new teachers in 1996. Districts also have had to use various means to create sufficient classroom space. At that time, California legislation mandated that at least 30% of all new classrooms were to be relocatable. Given a conservative estimate that 50% of the additional 18,000 teachers were somehow housed in existing facilities, our industry would have provided at least 3,000 classrooms for the additional teachers. Classroom size reduction clearly increases the demand for more classrooms, providing more opportunities for conventional construction as well as modular.

Finally, there are more kids going to school everyday. In 1987 nationally, we had 40,008,000 students in public schools. 27,933,000 were in primary school while 12,076,000 were enrolled in secondary schools. In 1997 the nation's public school enrollment was 46,353,000, with 33,216,000 in primary and 13,138,000 in secondary schools. This reflects an increase of 15.86 percent. Projection through the year 2007 has public schools with a total enrollment of 54,324,000 or an increase of 17.20 percent over today's enrollment. Private schools in 1987 had a total enrollment of 5,479,000. In 1997 enrollment in the nations private schools totaled 5,863,000. This reflected an increase of 7 percent. Enrollment projections for private schools are not available. While the above numbers represent the nation as a whole, Florida's growth is more typical of a high growth state. In the fall of 1997, total prekindergarten through twelfth grade enrollment in Florida was 2,290,726. When compared to the fall of 1993, enrollment was at 2,040,835 reflecting an increase of 249,891 students or 12.24 percent. If annualized and compared to the same time period as the national enrollment projections through the year 2007, Florida's enrollment would increase by a staggering 48.96 percent!

What Can We Do? Educate the educators as much as possible. Provide information that allows school officials to make informed choices. By utilizing whatever tools are available, it is critical that the user of our products know the options that we can offer. By making informed choices, and yes, maybe even spending a little more money up front, the user can realize much more value from their investment in modular construction. My experience is that users are not opposed to making choices that render higher initial cost if they are convinced the additional investment delivers a better building.

Two years ago Steven Winter embarked on creating software that would educate school facilities administrators to the various options that modular construction can offer. Schoolspec® is designed to be an interactive planning aid that helps determine the required space, provides various design and specification options and finally provides budgetary pricing for a specific need. The options center around space planning, aesthetics, energy efficiency, and life cycle costs. While many of the options seem somewhat unusual for the modular classroom market that we have become accustomed to, they offered a variety of choices that would allow the modular building to fit virtually any existing architectural environment. Winter reported that the software would be presented to the Department of Energy in April and will be available for MBI members later this summer. Once in publication it should allow classroom buyers an opportunity to see that modular construction can be more than just the bare minimums we're often associated with.

Deliver what and when promised. Many of us face short windows of opportunity in the educational market. Typically student enrollment projections are not defined until late in the school year. This usually means requirements are identified and must be executed during the short summer months. Our company typically addresses 50-60 contracts for classroom buildings every summer. This segment of our business demands more planning and constant attention than any larger single project we contract for. Typically the Project Manager's area takes on a "war room" atmosphere with the constant juggling of schedules and contractors due to changes in weather, permit delays, and hidden site conditions that cause delays. Without this planning and attention, we would not be able to participate in the market. Delays in the delivery and installation of classrooms cause hardships on educators that compound this already delicate issue. For all the various reasons, parent groups are not thrilled with the idea of modular classrooms to begin with, any delay in occupying the buildings only convince them more that modulars are not the right choice.

Along with timely deliveries, we must provide products that we would be thrilled for our own children to learn in. We all compete in arguably one of the most competitive segments of the industry when we build classrooms. With that said, it is still incumbent upon each of us to offer as much value as possible in the products and services we provide. When facing a challenge, take the highroad, go that little extra to achieve customer satisfaction. The idea is to determine exactly what the customer's expectation is, then exceed that by 10%. If everyone would be able to accomplish these, articles like that in the Inquirer would not be written.

Copyright © Modular Building Institute, May 1999.